Baby Troubles
by Silver Fox Trot
Summary: This is a series of 'What if' fics. What might have happened had the Yondaime, Minato Namikaze, never sealed Kyuubi in Naruto, because he hadn't attacked? Now updated with names, grammar-checked and typo-proofed.
1. Chapter 1

**Baby Troubles

* * *

**

Posted Feb. 15, 2006

* * *

He was the Yondaime; the fourth Hokage of the Village Hidden Amongst the Leaves. He was the teacher of three of the best Shinobi his village had ever produced. He knew almost as many jutsu as his predecessor did and had even created a few himself. There were few things about life he didn't know, but when it came to babies, he knew about as much as a first-year academy student knew about ANBU.

Which basically translated to nothing. He knew that they ate a lot, slept even more and in the four months since he became a father; were just about as hard to understand as women. That and they were prone to waking up at all hours for anything.

Yondaime sighed as put down his scrolls and pushed his bowl of ramen away and went to he pick up his crying son from his pen in the living room. His wife had decided that, after several weeks of constantly watching the baby and feeding him; she had earned a well deserved break and had left for the spa with her two girlfriends Uchiha Mikoto; the wife of his good friend and rival Uchiha Fugaku and another woman from the Haruno clan.

"What's wrong now, little guy? Need a diaper change?" Said the Yondaime and sniffed the diaper, then proceeded to gag. "Dear lord! How can a milk diet cause such a stench?"

He then brought his son and placed him on the changing table and removed the one-piece orange pyjama he had put on earlier for his nap and took out a fresh diaper and other baby-changing necessities. He slowly removed the old and dirty diaper and then promptly resisted the temptation to vomit. The smell was even worse!

He made a face and his son giggled, which caused the Yondaime to smile.

"Well, better get this done with, the faster I do it, the faster this will be over."

With the speed of a ninja, he changed the diaper, clean his sons' rear and put on a new clean diaper. Once that was done, he placed him back in the pen and picked up the scrolls the council had given him to read before the small ordeal had begun, as well eat some of his precious ramen.

He was able to read about three lines and have about one bite of food before Naruto began crying yet again.

He sighed yet again and went to go check up on his son.

"What's wrong now? I changed your diaper?" He asked despairingly and his son answered by crying even harder. "I know! You must be hungry; your mother did say to give you a bottle when you woke up from your nap."

So he once again picked up his son and brought him to the kitchen, set him on the highchair and looked through the fridge. By this point Naruto knew that he was going to be fed and was happily babbling in his chair and waving his arms.

Yondaime laughed as he searched through the fridge for the bottle his wife had prepared before she left. When he still hadn't found the bottle after several minutes of intense searching, he began to seriously panic.

Where was the bottle? He closed the fridge and began looking around the kitchen; maybe his wife had left it out so that it could be reading for feeding faster? He prayed to every deity that that was the case. He could hear Naruto start to fidget in his seat.

Finally, he found it! He made an astounding flying leap for the bottle on the other side of the kitchen.

"Aha! Found you at last! Huh?" He looked at the bottle. "Empty!"

Indeed, the bottle was empty, thanks to a small crack near the bottom, where all the milk had leaked out. Yondaime slumped on the floor. "Great, what else could go wrong today?" He asked himself.

"Gah! Gah!" Screamed Naruto from his seat, he looked up and saw his four-month old son reaching for the bowl of ramen he had left on the table. Suddenly he was struck with a brilliant idea! Even though his wife constantly said that ramen was unhealthy and pleaded for him to eat healthier foods, he never truly believed her. After all, he had eaten ramen for most of his teenage life between the time his parents had died and he found himself a wonderful cook to be his wife and look where he was! He was the Kage of one of the five most powerful Shinobi nations! It couldn't be all that bad, now could it?

He got up, threw the bottle in the garbage and grabbed a clean bottle from the cupboard and placed it on the table; picked up the bowl of ramen and quickly ate all the noodles, leaving only the broth, which he poured into the bottle and handed to his son when he was sure it was at the right temperature.

He smiled as his son began drinking the liquid enthusiastically.

"Now that we're both fed, maybe now I can get some work done!" Said Yondaime, taking a seat beside his soon and looking through his scrolls.

After a few minutes, he found a letter addressed to him from his wife. Curiosity getting the best of him, he opened it.

_Dear snookums, _

_Seeing as I have the day off and we need supplies that I noticed were running low this morning, I would want you to go and get them. It will do you some good to get some fresh air, bring Naruto with you, so you can do some male-bonding. When I get home you better have them or else you're sleeping on the couch for an undefined period of time._

_Love your darling wife; Snugly-bunny. _

The Yondaime turned red at the use of their pet names. His wife could be so embarrassing sometimes! He re-read the letter and sighed for the umpteenth time that day.

He looked at his son, who was drinking from his bottle with the same vigour as before and got up. He picked his son up and brought him to his room to dress him; he was not going to bring his son outside in only his diaper in February!

Thus, he dressed his son in a pair of bright green overalls and a long-sleeved yellow shirt, so that he'd be easy to spot if he got lost. All the while his son wouldn't let go of the bottle, which caused a little bit of difficulty with the sweater. He also put on his little orange and blue coat for added warmth. His wife would do nothing short of killing him if their son got so much as a sniffle.

When he was done, he picked up his son and headed for the grocery store in typical ninja fashion; jumping from rooftop to rooftop. Once he got to the local general store, he grabbed a cart and put his son in the child seat.

* * *

After about an hour of looking around he met with some familiar faces. 

"Sensei!" Yelled the ever-cherry Rin, she was accompanied by her team-mates Kakashi and Obito, who were both holding small baskets with various stuff in it. Surprisingly, there was also a fourth member in their party; it was a young dark-eyed baby who was being cuddled by Rin.

"Hello Rin-chan, Kakashi-kun, Obito-kun! Who might this little guy be?" Asked the Yondaime curiously. He knew it couldn't be Rin's, because he knew she hadn't been pregnant, nor could it be Kakashis' because of the colouring of the hair seeing as all Hatake had children with silver or platinum hair and it couldn't be Obitos' because he was in love with Rin.

"Sensei, this is Uchiha Sasuke, the son of Fugaku-san and Mikoto-san." Introduced Rin, shifting the young child so that he was facing him. He was amused when the young child scowled at him. Oh, he was defiantly an Uchiha alright. "Isn't he just adorable? Mikoto-san asked Obito-kun and Kakashi-kun to watch him while she went out with some friends. Fugaku-san is busy with work and Itachi-kun is in school right now. Since both of them are as helpless with babies as you are with cooking anything edible!"

Yondaime just laughed weakly. What could he say in defence? It's true that he was hopeless in cooking anything more complicated than ramen or rice.

"So, what brings you guys here?" He asked, trying to change the conversation to anything besides his cooking skills, or lack thereof. His, meanwhile, was busy staring at the young Uchiha, who was staring back.

"Well, you see…" Said Obito, trying to think of an excuse, but Kakashi, practical as always, answered for him.

"We ran out of diapers and baby food, so we had to go buy some." Said the masked boy.

"What about you, sensei?" Asked Rin curiously.

"Oh, same thing. The wife wanted me to run some errands at the same time. At least I get to spend some quality time with the baby."

"I know! Why don't we finish our shopping together and then head over to the park to let Sasuke-chan and Naruto-chan play together? We could even go for supper at that new ramen place! I think it's called Ichiraku or something like that." Suggest Rin, putting Sasuke beside Naruto in the cart.

"Eh…sure, I'm almost done though. All I have to do is go to the check out." Said Yondaime as he watched his son and the Uchiha look at each curiously.

So, they proceeded to buy their stuff and head towards the new ramen shop. Yondaime was having a little trouble holding his new purchases and Naruto at the same time, seeing as the little boy had taken to whacking him with his empty bottle. Luckily Rin saved him by picking up Naruto and carrying him the rest of the way.

Once they got there, they each ordered some ramen to go and then headed for the park, where they set the babies in the sand box with a bottle each then dug into their supper eagerly and talked about what they had been doing recently.

* * *

Naruto looked at his new companion. He was drinking from his bottle with his eyes closed, fully concentrated on the task at hand. Naruto looked down at his half-filled bottle, it didn't taste good as what his father had given him earlier and so he wasn't as interested in this as he was in the other one. Once he had had his fill he stopped drinking and now he was bored. 

He looked at his father and those weird people they had met earlier and they were eating what he had had earlier! He wanted some too! How to get some was the question though. He tried to remember where they had gotten it.

After several minutes of serious thought, he remembered and he threw his bottle in the air in joy and started crawling in the direction they had come from. One thing that he didn't notice, however, was that his bottle had hit a certain Uchiha in the head.

* * *

Sasuke turned, angry at whatever had hit him and saw the blond crawling away. It must have been him! He wanted to teach the blond brat a lesson, so he followed the little blond.

* * *

Meanwhile, Yondaime and his former students were eating their meal, not noticing that their charges had managed to escape. It was only when Rin had finished that she noticed they were gone. 

"Sensei!" She shouted. "The babies are missing!"

The Yondaime dropped his bowl of ramen. "What?" He took a quick look around to confirm. "Shit!"

"What do we do?"

"Listen. They're just babies, they can't have wandered far, I suggest we split up and look around. Kakashi, summon your nin-dogs to help." Said Yondaime while trying to calm the frantic Rin down.

"Can't." Said the masked Nin.

"Why not! It's an emergency!" Stated Obito.

"I left my summoning scroll at home."

"That's just great. Well, we'll have to make do with what we got. We'll split into two teams. Kakashi, you and Obito look around the basketball courts. Rin, you and I will look around the play area. We'll meet back here in twenty minutes, whether we have the babies or not. If we haven't found them by then, I'll call an official search."

"Rodger!" Said the trio and they headed off in their instructed direction.

* * *

Yondaime and Rin, after several minutes of searching, found a trail. Not just any trail though, this was a trail made by two babies. They followed it and at the end, found little Naruto and Sasuke slowly making their way to Kami-knows-where. They each grabbed one gave them a once over to look for any serious damage, once both Shinobi were satisfied, they made their way back to the park. 

Once they met up with Kakashi and Obito, they decided that they had had enough excitement for the day and each went their separate ways; Rin to her home, Kakashi and Obito to the Uchiha compound and the Yondaime to his own apartment near the Hokage tower.

* * *

Once they got home, Yondaime just dropped what he had bought earlier onto the table - he'd put it away later – and went straight into the living room, where he dropped himself onto his couch and promptly fell asleep with Naruto, who had fallen asleep en route, on his chest. 

That was the scene upon which the Yondaimes' saw when she entered her house. She smiled, glad that the two important men in her life were safe and sound. She placed a blanket on top of them then took out her camera and snapped several photo's to show to her friends the next time they went out. Maybe she could ask her husband if he minded if her and her girlfriends spent a well deserved weekend at that spa resort she had read about in Suna?

* * *

Authors Note; Well, I'm glad I got THAT out of my system! I know the end isn't as good as I wanted it to be, but I just wanted to finish the darn thing! I might work on it in the future though, if any good ideas pop into my head. Here are some special notes. 

The Yondaime; I know it's never been confirmed that the Yondaime is Naruto's father, but I personally believe he is and will continue to do so unless Masashi Kishimoto himself says otherwise.

This fic is a What-If fic, so this is what I think might have happened had Obito not died and the Kyuubi not attacked.

It's my first one-shot, so please be gentle, but if you see any errors, just tell me and I'll fix them ASAP.

Thank you for your time and please review!


	2. Ch 1 V 20

Baby Troubles V.2

Narutos Day Out

* * *

Posted January 30, 2008

* * *

His name was Minato Namikaze, the fourth Hokage of the Village Hidden Amongst the Leaves. He was the teacher of three of the best Shinobi his village had ever produced. He knew almost as many jutsu as his predecessor did and had even created a few himself. There were few things about life he didn't know, but when it came to babies, he knew about as much as a first-year academy student knew about ANBU.

Which basically translated to nothing. He knew that they ate a lot, slept even more and in the eight months since he became a father; that babies were just about as hard to understand as women. And they were prone to waking up at all hours for anything.

Minato sighed as put down his scrolls and pushed his bowl of ramen away and went to he pick up his crying son from his pen in the living room. His wife had decided that, after several month of constantly watching the baby and feeding him; she had earned a well deserved break and had left for the spa with her two girlfriends Uchiha Mikoto; the wife of his good friend and rival Uchiha Fugaku and a friend of hers from the Haruno clan.

"What's wrong now, little guy? Need a diaper change?" Said Minato, picking up his son and sniffing the diaper, and then proceeded to gag. "Dear lord! How can a milk diet cause such a stench?!"

He brought his son to the changing table and removed the one-piece orange pyjama he had put on his son earlier for his nap, took out a fresh diaper as well as other baby-changing paraphernalia. He slowly removed the old, dirty diaper and then promptly resisted the temptation to vomit again. The smell was even worse!

He made a face and his son giggled, which caused Minato to smile brightly. His son had such an adorable laugh!

"Well, better get this done with, the faster I do it, the faster this will be over."

With the speed the Yellow Flash of Konoha was known for, he changed the diaper, cleaned his sons' rear and put on a new clean diaper.

Once that was done, he placed his son back in his playpen, picked up the important scrolls the council had given him to read before the small ordeal had begun, his some of his precious ramen and proceeded to get back to work.

He was able to read about three words and have about one bite of food before Naruto began crying yet again.

He sighed and went to go check up on his son, again.

"What's wrong now? I changed your diaper!" He asked desperately and his son answered by crying even harder.

Minato thought for a few seconds before he figured out what was wrong.

"I know! You must be hungry; your mother did say to give you a bottle when you woke up from your nap."

So, he once again picked up his son, brought him to the kitchen, set him on the highchair and looked through the fridge. By this point Naruto knew that he was going to be fed and was happily babbling in his chair and waving his arms.

Minato laughed at his sons' antics as he searched through the fridge for the bottle his wife had prepared before she left. When he hadn't found the bottle after several minutes of intense searching, he began to panic.

Where was the bottle? He closed the fridge and began looking around the kitchen; maybe his wife had left it out so that it could be reading for feeding when needed? He prayed to every deity that that was the case. He could hear Naruto start to fidget in his seat.

Finally, he found it! He made an astounding flying leap for the bottle on the other side of the kitchen.

"Aha! Found you at last!" He looked at the bottle. "Huh? Empty!"

Indeed, the bottle was empty. Thanks to a small crack near the bottom, where all the milk had leaked out. Minato slumped on the floor. "Great. What else could go wrong today?" He muttered to himself.

"Gah, gah!" Gurgled Naruto from his seat. Minato looked up and saw his eight-month old son reaching for the bowl of ramen he had left on the table. Suddenly, he was struck with an idea!

Even though his wife constantly said that ramen was unhealthy and pleaded for him to eat healthier foods, he never truly believed her. After all, he had eaten ramen for most of his teenage life between the time his parents had died and he found himself a wonderful cook to be his wife and look where he was! He was the Kage of one of the five most powerful Shinobi nations! It couldn't be all that bad, now could it?

He got up, threw the bottle in the garbage, grabbed a clean bottle from the cupboard and placed it on the table. Minato picked up the bowl of ramen and ate all the noodles, leaving only the warm broth, which he poured into the bottle and handed to his son when he was sure that it wouldn't burn his son.

He smiled as his son began drinking the broth with more enthusiasm he had ever seen in his son.

"Now that we're both fed, maybe now I can get some work done?" Asked Minato, taking a seat beside his son and looking through his scrolls once again.

Quickly growing bored, he looked around the kitchen for something to occupy his mind while Naruto finished his bottle.

After a few minutes, he found a letter addressed to him from his wife stuck on the fridge. Curiosity getting the best of him, he opened it.

_Dear __To-to-kun, _

_Seeing as I have the day off and we need supplies that I noticed were running low this morning, I want you to go and get them. It will do you some good to get some fresh ai__r. Bring Naruto with you, so you can do some father-son-bonding. When I get home you better have them or else you're sleeping on the couch!_

_Love your__, darling wife_

_Shi-chan. _

Minato turned red at the use of their pet names. His wife could be so embarrassing sometimes! He re-read the letter, pulled out a list of groceries and sighed for the umpteenth time that day.

He looked at his son, who was still drinking from his bottle with the same vigour as before. He stood up and picked his son up and brought him to his room to dress him. He was not going to bring his son outside in only his diaper in February! The fact that his wife would kill him otherwise also helped.

Thus, he dressed his son in a pair of bright green overalls and a long-sleeved yellow sweater, so that he'd be easy to spot if he got lost. All the while his son wouldn't let go of the bottle, which caused a little bit of trouble with the sweater. He also put on his little orange and blue coat for added warmth. His wife would do nothing short of killing him if their son got so much as a sniffle.

When he was done, he picked up his son and headed for the grocery store in typical ninja fashion; jumping from rooftop to rooftop. Once he got there, he grabbed a cart and put his son in the child seat.

* * *

After about an hour of looking around for some weird spice he couldn't find, he met with some familiar faces.

"Sensei!" Yelled the ever-cheery Rin, she was accompanied by her team-mates Kakashi and Obito, who were both holding small baskets with various food-stuffs in it.

Surprisingly, there was also a fourth member in their party; a young dark-eyed baby who was being carried by Rin.

"Hello, Rin-chan, Kakashi-kun, Obito-kun! Who might this little guy be?" Asked Minato curiously. He knew it couldn't be Rins' child, because he knew she hadn't been pregnant, nor could it be Kakashis' because of the colouring of the hair, seeing as all Hatake had children with silver or platinum hair, and it couldn't be Obitos' because he was in love with Rin.

"Sensei, this is Uchiha Sasuke, son of Fugaku-san and Mikoto-san." Introduced Rin, shifting the young child so that the baby was facing Minato. He laughed when the young child scowled at him. Oh, he was defiantly an Uchiha alright.

"Isn't he just adorable? Mikoto-san asked Obito-kun and Kakashi-kun to watch him while she went out with some friends. Fugaku-san is busy with work and Itachi-kun is in school right now. Since both of them are as helpless with babies as you are with cooking anything edible, they practically begged me for help."

Minato just laughed weakly. What could he say in defence? It's true that he was hopeless in cooking anything more complicated than ramen or rice.

"So, what brings you guys here?" He asked, trying to change the conversation to anything besides his cooking skills, or lack thereof. His son, meanwhile, was busy staring curiously at the young Uchiha, who was staring back with equal curiosity.

"Well, you see," Started Obito, trying to think of an excuse, but Kakashi, practical as always, answered for him.

"We ran out of diapers and baby food, so we had to go buy some." Said the masked boy.

"What about you, sensei?" Asked Rin curiously.

"Oh, same thing. The wife wanted me to run some errands. At least it means I get to spend some quality time with the baby."

"I know! Why don't we finish our shopping together and then head over to the park to let Sasuke-kun and Naruto-kun play together? We could even go for supper at that new ramen place! I think it's called Ichiraku or something like that." Suggest Rin, putting Sasuke beside Naruto in the cart. They fussed a bit, but did nothing besides stare at each other. Naruto still had the bottle in his mouth, but it appeared that Naruto hadn't noticed it was empty.

"Eh…sure, I'm almost done though. All I have to do is go to the check out." Said Minato, grabbing some random spice, as he watched his son and the Uchiha look at each curiously.

So, they proceeded to pay for their stuff and head towards the new ramen shop. Minato was having a little trouble holding his purchases and Naruto at the same time, seeing as the little boy had taken to whacking him on the head with his empty bottle. Luckily Rin saved him by picking up Naruto and carrying him and Sasuke the rest of the way.

Once they got there, they each ordered some ramen to go and then headed for the nearest park, where they sat the babies in the sand box with a bottle each, Narutos' once again being filled with ramen broth, courtesy of Ichiraku Ramen, then they dug into their supper eagerly and talked about what they had been doing recently.

* * *

Naruto looked at his companion. Sasuke was eagerly drinking from his bottle with his eyes closed, fully concentrated on the task at hand; namely, eating. Naruto looked down at his now half-filled bottle, it didn't taste good as what his father had given him earlier so he wasn't as interested in this one as he was in the one from before. Once he had had his fill he stopped drinking and now he was bored.

He looked at his father and those weird people they had met earlier and noticed that they were eating what he had had earlier! He wanted some too! How to get some was the question though. He tried to remember where they had gotten it.

After several minutes of serious thought, he remembered. He threw his bottle in the air in joy and started crawling in the direction they had come from. One thing that he didn't notice, however, was that his bottle had hit a certain Uchiha in the head.

* * *

Sasuke turned around when something hit him on the head, angry and saw the blond baby crawling away. It must have been him! He wanted to teach the blond brat a lesson, so he started crawling after the little blond.

* * *

Meanwhile, Minato and his students were eating their meal, not noticing that their young charges had crawled away. It was only when Rin had finished her ramen that she noticed they were gone.

"Sensei!" She shouted. "The babies are gone!"

Minato dropped his bowl of ramen. "What?" He took a quick look around to confirm this fact. "Shit!"

"What do we do?" Asked Obito.

"Listen. They're just babies, they can't have wandered far. I suggest we split up and look around. Kakashi, summon your nin-dogs to help." Ordered Minato, all the while trying to calm the frantic Rin.

"Can't." Stated the masked Nin calmly.

"Why not! It's an emergency!" Stated Obito.

"I left my summoning scroll at home."

"That's just great. Well, we'll have to make do with what we got. We'll split into two teams." Said Minato. He pointed to the two boys of his team. "Kakashi, you and Obito look around the basketball courts. Rin, you and I will look around the play area. We'll meet back here in twenty minutes, whether we have the babies or not. If we haven't found them by then, I'll call ANBU."

"Roger!" Said the trio and they headed off in their instructed directions.

* * *

Minato and Rin, after several minutes of searching, finally found a trail. Not just any trail though, this was a trail made by two crawling babies.

They followed it and at the end of the trail they found Naruto and Sasuke slowly crawling towards Kami-knows-where.

They each grabbed a baby and gave them a once over to look for any injuries, once both Shinobi were satisfied, they made their way back to the park, still holding onto the disgruntled babies.

Once they met up with Kakashi and Obito, they decided that they had had enough excitement for the day and each went their separate way; Rin, Kakashi and Obito left for the Uchiha compound and Minato left for his own residence near the Hokage tower.

* * *

Once they got home, Minato just dropped what he had bought earlier onto the table – he figured he'd put them away later – and went straight into the living room, where he dropped himself onto his couch and promptly fell asleep with Naruto, who had fallen asleep en route, drooling on his chest.

This was the scene upon which Kushina saw as she entered her house. She smiled, happy knowing that the two most important men in her life were safe and sound. She placed a fleece blanket on top of them then took out her camera.

She snapped several photos to show to her friends the next time they went out. Maybe she could ask her husband if he minded if her and her girlfriends spent a well deserved weekend at that spa resort she had read about in Suna?

* * *

Authors Note;

Here's an updated version on the previous fic. I decided that it was about time to update it because a) we have CANON proof on who Narutos' father is b) we have names of both parents c) we know what Kushina looks like and last d) I wanted to see how much my writing has improved since I started college.

I originally wrote this the year before I entered college. I shuddered when I read it again for the first time in nearly two years. Think you guys could review and tell me what you think of the difference?

If I get enough reviews, I might decide to create more in the 'Baby Troubles' series.


	3. Chapter 2, pt 1

Baby Troubles

CH 2. Rivalry Starts Early

Part 1; everything sets Up.

* * *

Posted February 2, 2008

* * *

Being Hokage had many perks, such as free ramen every Wednesday at Ichiraku, a home that gave him the best view of his beloved village and last, but certainly not least, he had the love and adoration of everyone in the village, both Shinobi and civilians.

However, being Hokage also meant that he had to do many things he'd rather not do, like meeting the Daimyo of the Land of Fire, thankfully he only had to do that every few years, on formal occasions.

Another thing he could never avoid was paperwork. Lots of paperwork. Fortunately, he had a loving, understanding and helpful wife. So, when one day he sent a message begging for help she obligingly arranged for a babysitter for Naruto and helped her husband with the paperwork that was getting the better of him.

* * *

Kakashis' day had started the same way it usually did. He got up before the sun rose, fed his nin-dogs, ate a quick, healthy breakfast, got dressed and did some chores. 

Once he finished, he took a quick shower. Just as he was about to leave to meet up with his team, he noticed that one of Konohas' messenger pigeons had landed on his windowsill.

He picked up the pigeon, removed the note from the case on its leg and let the bird go free. The message was from Kushina.

Curious as to why his sensei's wife would be sending _him_ a messenger pigeon; read the rather short note.

Immediately, his eye-brow started to twitch. It was going to be a _long_ day.

* * *

Half an hour later, Kakashi found himself knocking on the door of his sensei's house and walked in. He and his team had been in the Hokage Residence often enough that they were encouraged to treat it as a second home. 

"Ah, Kakashi-kun! I'm so glad you made it!" Fussed Kushina as she moved about the kitchen. "I'm sorry to ask you to come here on such short notice, but Minato _really_ needs help. The Daimyo and his wife are planning a visit _and_ tensions with Hidden Cloud are escalating."

Kakashi nodded, he understood that being Hokage was a difficult and often tedious job and it wasn't all glamour, like some civilians believed.

"Naruto is sleeping in the nursery, but he might wake up in an hour or so. I have some formula in the fridge for when he wakes up. If you need some more, the powder is in the cabinet over the fridge." Her instructions finished, Kushina left to help her poor husband.

After she left, Kakashi went room-to-room. Once he had memorized the placement of each object in all the rooms, so that he'd know if someone moved them while he was in another room, he visited the nursery to watch the sleeping Naruto.

If he was the kind of person to awe at adorable things, he would have done so at the sight of Naruto, sleeping in his bright orange and blue pyjamas, sucking on his pacifier and holding a puppy plushie almost as big as he was.

He drank in the sight of Naruto before returning to the living room. Being a Shinobi meant having hard life, sometimes; on the worst days, where friends and family where _bleeding_ and _dieing_ he had a hard time trying to remember _why_ he fought so hard, _why_ he continued this lifestyle.

Whenever it got difficult, he remembered all his friends in Konoha, all the good times he had with his team, now, he had another memory to add to that priceless collection.

* * *

Kakashi had been on his own for all of five minutes before someone knocked on the door. He barely had time to react before the door opened and Obito entered. Kakashi secretly put away the kunai he had grabbed. 

"Kakashi! You're here, that's great!" Exclaimed Obito as he closed the door behind him. "I need some help."

It was at this point that Kakashi noticed that his friend and team-mate was not alone. Obito has carrying something, or rather, someone, familiar in his arms.

"Obito. Why do you have Sasuke-kun with you?"

"Oh, Mikoto-san asked me to baby-sit again. The Uchiha are busy fortifying all the homes. Mikoto-san was worried that Sasuke might get hurt if he wanders off again; he's already gotten away. Twice." Said Obito as he put a blue baby bag down beside the door and removed his shoes.

"I figured Minato-sensei would have tons of paper-work to do and Kushina-san would go help him. Since they can't bring Naruto with them, they'd probably call you to watch Naruto." Obito bent down to put some house-slippers on. "Oh, and Rin-san said there was something she wanted to talk to us about so I told her to meet us here."

Kakashi nodded as Obito left for the nursery to place the sleeping Sasuke with Naruto in the crib. When he came back, Kakashi promptly started ignoring his chattering team-mate. Thankfully, he didn't to ignore him long, because within a matter of minutes there was another knock at the door and once again, someone came in.

Having been forewarned this time, he wasn't surprised when Rin entered the Hokage residence. What did surprise him, however, was that she too, had a baby in her arms.

"You got stuck baby-sitting too, Rin-chan?" Asked Obito.

"Eh?" Asked a confused Rin as she put a pink baby-bag on the floor and removed her shoes, carefully holding the pink-haired baby in her arms.

"Kakashis' babysitting Naruto-kun and I have to watch Sasuke-kun. How'd you get stuck with yours?" Asked Obito.

"Oh, Kaa-san owed Haruno-san a favour and I owed Kaa-san a favour. One thing led to another and I have to watch Sakura-chan for the day." Replied Rin, putting on a pair of house-slippers. "I'll go put Sakura-chan with the boys, then. I have some things Sensei wanted me to go over with you."

Rin entered nursery, smiled at the two boys sleeping in the crib and placed Sakura between them. Little did she know what kind of trouble this action would lead to.

* * *

Authors note. 

Well, my small apartment has been infested with plot bunnies and my roommates have demand that I get rid of them. NOW.

This chapter was supposed to be longer, but I felt that now was a good time to finish it. This chapter focused heavily on Kakashi, but next on will feature Baby!Naruto, Baby!Sasuke and the newest addition Baby!Sakura.

While looking at Naruto stuff on the internet I noticed something funny, out of the Genin that make up Team 7, Sakura is the oldest, followed by Sasuke, and the youngest is Naruto. Sakura was born March 28, three days before mine, in case you wanted to know, Sasuke was born July 23 and Naruto October 10.

This means that Sakura is three months older than Sasuke, who, in turn is three months older than Naruto. Since Naruto is about nine months old right now, this takes place in July. Sakura is already one and Sasuke is almost one. This info isn't important to know, but at this point, I think it's a good idea of how different their development might be because of age difference and their abilities.

A good example of the difference is that Sakura will start talking before Naruto does. Six months is a BIG difference for babies.


	4. Sidefic Strong

After Naruto was born, Minato lost count of how many times the people he encountered predicted and hoped that his son would grow up to be like his father, the best Shinobi in all of Konoha

Strong

Written Saturday May 10, 2008

Posted same day

Disclaimer. I do not own Naruto.

After Naruto was born, Minato lost count of how many times the people he encountered predicted and hoped that his son would grow up to be like his father, the best Shinobi in all of Konoha. No, best of all Shinobi in the world!

Minato also lost count of how many times he wished their predictions wouldn't come true. He wished for his son to be strong, yes, but not the best.

To be the best meant to be the first.

The first Shinobi to be sent into battle.

The first to battle the enemy.

The first to feel the blood of his enemy spraying into his face as he slit their throats.

The first to be asked by the children about the glory (horror), of the war.

No, Minato wishes for his son to be strong.

Strong enough to protect his family.

Strong enough to protect his friends.

Strong enough to protect his village.

Strong enough to go though all that he'll have to endure, his first crush, his first rejection, his first kiss, strong enough to last and come out a better person.

Minato hopes that his son does not become the best, so that he does not have to be the one to send his son into a battle first.

AN: this is just something I thought about before going to bed last night. Everyone wants to be the best, but sometimes being the best isn't all that great.


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